Today's flight for 2018

[ragedracer1977]

23 hours ago, KLRDMD said:

I may fly out there tomorrow and look. I have an unscheduled day off.

I stopped there about midnight on Saturday, stopped just for the $4 fuel.  Thankfully I wasn’t on E, cause it was broke again.  

And just to keep the pictures rolling, my son wanted a pic with the DC-3 currently sitting at DVT 

[carusoam]

That DC3 could use some vinyl graphics... 

Best regards,

-a-

[Yooper Rocketman]

We left 12” of fresh snow on top of old melted down 6” of snow this morning for Spruce Creek Florida.   I asked the wife as we were driving out our driveway at 5:30 AM if she was sure she wanted to do this and got an emphatic YES.  It was 16 degrees F and forecast for tomorrow night down around 6 degrees.

I took a shot of my home town as the sun was rising.   I love my Rocket and a bit of tailwind, seeing 258 knots GS for a bit with a 20 degree crab.  Have to wonder what we would have seen if going directly with the wind?  Total flight time from the U.P. of Michigan to just south of Daytona Beach: under 5 hours.  The new G5 was awesome too!

The flannel shirt was the first thing shed when the door was opened arriving at our taxiway home (75 degrees).

Tom

[ragedracer1977]

Played corporate pilot and flew my wife and her friend to Vegas last night.   Planned arrival just after sunset so they could enjoy the lights.   Usually get the Cortez route to VGT, but last night they vectored right over the approach end of mccarran and then right over the strip.  It was beautiful.   Only "fun" part was the slam dunk.  They restricted me to 6500 until I was less than 8 miles from VGT.  Thankful for speed brakes.  Dropped her like a rock and hit pattern altitude (3000) just abeam midfield.  

Here's a pic of heading home.   I love flying at night!

 

[Skates97]

I finally got around to putting together the video from taking my dad flying up the Salt River Lakes in AZ at the end of January.

Salt River "Flightseeing"

 

[bonal]

Fresh oil change and thankfully had another clean screen once again.  So for today we flew down to LVK to celebrate two birthdays mom turned 97 and hanging tough. Had to dodge a few clouds along our path but otherwise very nice weather for flight. Landing was so smooth I could not tell when the wheels were on the Tarmac.  Trip home and we were treated to some free gas courtesy of some uplift on the west side of Mt Diablo giving us 1500 fpm at 125 mph. Once leveled off my wife felt like she wanted to sleep the way home so climbed in the back to lay down. Once I got things trimmed out we picked up a solid 4 knots with her in the back too bad we had a healthy headwind for most of the trip home but always nice to see the airspeed in the yellow during level flight.  Sure is nice to be able to avoid all that Bay Area traffic and turn a two and a half hour drive into a forty five minute flight. 

Edited April 9, 2018 by bonal

[EricJ]

Went to Lake Havasu (KHII) for lunch with a friend today.   Seems like every time I go there something interesting happens.   The last time just as I arrived a V-22 made a low pass.   This time just as we were leaving this guy was making low passes.

 

[jackn]

Getting set-up for the US Open. 

[Yetti]

Made hop over to Austin today.  The wind sock was pointing at the plane when I saw it.   It was a headwind for the first plane landing, then it was calm for the second plane.  It was like most Texas flying in the spring.  Shall we say Sporting.   I got a "wohoo" "show me some of that pilot stuff" as we kept it straight but a bit goosey down the runway.

[CDO]

Went for a scenic flight along the shoreline Cape May and AC

[carusoam]

CDO,

Are you Jersian,  or just flying by?

Best rgeards,

-a-

[Skates97]

I took a nice, bouncy flight last night from Corona to Hemet. A chance to get back up and do some navigating to a new airport at night.

http://intothesky.us/2018/04/11/hemet-at-night/

I need to post up about my trip to Phoenix a week ago to take 3 small dogs to a rescue and visit family. In the mean time you should get a kick out of this interaction with SoCal Approach as we neared March ARB on our descent into Corona. There was a Centurion ahead of us on the same frequency also heading into Corona that we had heard reporting blue lasar lights north of March ARB. As we got closer SoCal warned us.

SoCal: "Mooney 78878, use caution, unauthorized lasar lights reported by a Centurion about a mile and a half ahead of your current position."
Me: "Roger, we'll keep an eye out for it." (Obviously not my best choice of words)
SoCal: "I'm not sure keeping an eye out is the best idea."
Me: "Yes, I meant that we will let you know if we see them." 

Just then someone else piped up on the frequency and said, "I thought that was funny." 

[bonal]

Well today for some reason we took Snoopy down to Paso Robles. Weather was as good as it gets cruise was at 7500 and we were getting 170 mph ground with almost no wind. As we were approaching Napa, ATC called out a fast mover at our 12 o'clock low and was about to turn us when I spotted what looked like a Citation he was heading in the opposite direction and passed below and to our right by only a couple hundred feet. Lots of traffic today but that was only close one.  As we were getting close to Paso Robles Oakland center was talking to someone that was approaching the airport and commented that there were at least 4 Mooneys in the pattern there and that they must be having some kind of fly in there. I commented that they should expect about 50 arrivals and the controller commented it seemed like a hundred. A nice approach led to a very smooth landing and we were marshaled to a great parking spot next to a whole bunch of Mooneys.

After a great gathering of Mooney Spacers it was time to head for home. We requested flight following but at the time there were a few of us and so center had us stand by. As we were cruising along at 6500 center advised of a Mooney on same heading and altitude passing us to our right with a 20 knot closure. He was easy to spot and I think he may have been going to Hayward. Not sure who he was. Then a funny thing happened to us as we were nearing Napa ATC called out a traffic alert when I spotted a small biz jet at our 9 o'clock passed under us left to right from 90 degrees just a couple hundred feet below. It seemed weird that both jets were I'd as unknown by the controllers. Things got a little bumpy as we neared home normal for the afternoons here but a satisfying landing put a finish to a fine day.

[Yetti]

Got down to 95 knots going north.  157 knots on the way back  wacked my head on the roof one time good.   was also ducking down on landing in Dallas.

[Skates97]

Loved the fly-in yesterday in Paso Robles. I hope you enjoy the write up as much as I enjoyed the event and writing about it.

If you build it, they will come... KPRB Fly-In

[mpg]

I enjoyed your write up, as I have enjoyed all your stories.  like I said before,, you must have a really good typewriter....

But this is different.

You tried to make a flyin some time back, but it didnt take off,,,   -1,,,  OK.

This time you tried again,,,   you were the germ, you planted a seed, and it was good.

Some help came to help tend that germ, that seed, that Idea,,,  and it grew!

I have known you for a long time through this forum, and think we are friends.

I am proud of what you have done.

Your germ/seed has produced what is probably the biggest gathering of Mooney's ANYWHERE,,,EVER!!!

thanks for the write up and the pics...

[Skates97]

7 hours ago, mpg said:

I enjoyed your write up, as I have enjoyed all your stories.  like I said before,, you must have a really good typewriter....

But this is different.

You tried to make a flyin some time back, but it didnt take off,,,   -1,,,  OK.

This time you tried again,,,   you were the germ, you planted a seed, and it was good.

Some help came to help tend that germ, that seed, that Idea,,,  and it grew!

I have known you for a long time through this forum, and think we are friends.

I am proud of what you have done.

Your germ/seed has produced what is probably the biggest gathering of Mooney's ANYWHERE,,,EVER!!!

thanks for the write up and the pics...

Thanks, all the credit goes to @mooneyflyer and @MrRodgers. Phil gave it a place to happen and was an amazing host. Mike created the West Coast Mooney Club, worked on sponsors, got the message out, etc... Without the two of them it would have probably been 5-10 Mooneys somewhere having lunch, which would have been fun, but with them it was awesome!! I can't even imagine the hours they put into making it the success that it was.

[KLRDMD]

OK, not Mooney efficiency but not bad for what it is.

+/- 150 KTAS on less than 16 GPH (9.375 NMPG) at 7,500 ft this morning.

OR I can get 175 KTAS on 20 GPH (8.75 NMPG)

OR 190 KTAS on 24 GPH (7.9 NMPG).

In my 231 at 7,500 ft I get 155 KTAS on 9.0 GPH (17 NMPG) - but I can't fit six people in the Mooney and it doesn't have a useful load over 1700 lb either.

[KLRDMD]

Friday morning I went down to the west coast of the Baja of Mexico with the Flying Samaritans, Tucson, AZ chapter. Our clinic is at El Rosario and we stay in San Quintin. I returned yesterday morning. I'm on the board of directors and usually make 5-6 trips a year. This was Saturday at 7PM from my hotel room.

http://www.flyingsamaritansaz.org/Tucson/index.html

[KLRDMD]

Also from the hotel in Mexico this weekend, Saturday morning.

[amillet]

Return flight from PPP in Henderson, NV.  My longest nonstop flight ever. Still had legal reserve of fuel. You can see from my ground speed fluctuations that I was in mountain waves. VMC until OR border, then between layers until I crossed the Cascades, then solid IMC until about 50 miles from home where I broke out at 6,800.  No turbulence 

[Hank]

Dang good looking spinner, Dave! And a most un-C-like nise behind it, too. Now keep her looking sharp like this . . . .

[carusoam]

Expect the corrosionX to seep out for at least six months or more... it’s a sign of it doing its work...covering everything to the last molecule.... unfortunately, it looks similar to smoking rivets while it does this seeping thing. I used maguires cleaner wax to clean the CX off.   The cleanerwax is probably not recommended as it removes a layer of paint with it...

My old C would be jealous of the well kept Cs around here...  her last significant upgrade was a Loran...

Best regards,

-a-

[Skates97]

Not a flight but some hangar time yesterday. I went straight there after work, got started about 7pm, called it quits at 11pm, and will finish up stuff Saturday morning.

• Changed the oil. (Still need to cut open the filter)
• Replaced the gasket on the oil fill tube that was leaking. The old one was hard and brittle but I think this will take care of that pesky leak.
• Cleaned and rotated the plugs. Took a look around in the cylinders with the borescope.
• Checked to oil screen. This is the first time I have done this myself and it is the beast that everyone has said it is and was probably 2 hours of my time with about 1.5 of that spent on the stupid safety wire. I can think of about 20 different things they could change in the way everything fits down there that would have made it a lot easier to safety wire it. After doing it this time I learned a few things and could probably cut that time significantly next time. The screen was clean with a couple little black flecks that crumbled when rubbed between my fingers so I am assuming carbon? 

Still to do

• Check water levels in battery
• Ground run then check for leaks
• Button everything back up and go have some fun

[bonal]

Well for today it was my flight review so my instructor and I made our way to STS for lunch. Once we cleared the ridge it was time for some slow flight maneuvers boy that sure does a number on the CHT then cleared to straight in for landing after a very disappointing BLT we started out departing 20 at about 300agl he took the controls so I could put on the hood for some instrument work then we did a bunch of heading and altitude changes tracked a couple vor's crossed the ridge towards home with more heading and descents until we were entering the pattern and on the midfield DW let me have my eyes outside again. Nice to be set for the next two years and now on the list is my ECI on the prop hub. Definitely want to do more hood time but at least I feel confident that if I were to fly into IMC I would be able to get out of it of course if I were I would engage the auto pilot and make my 180 with the heading bug on the panel. Doing all the hood time was a great workout today i imagine since I did the whole journey  unable to see out the window and was just following my instructors directions was kind of like being in IMC until we were at pattern altitude on the down wind and right on speed. Good times.

Edited April 22, 2018 by bonal